Miles to Links (mi to li)

1 mile equals 8,000 links exactly.

1 mile = 8,000 links

How to convert miles to links

To convert miles to links, multiply the number of miles by 8,000. This factor is exact. To go the other way, multiply links by 0.000125.

links = miles × 8,000

Example: 10 miles = 80,000 links.

About these units

Mile (mi)

US & ImperialCurrent unit

5,280 feet or 1,760 yards, exactly 1,609.344 meters. This is the statute (international) mile used on US and UK roads.

A thousand paces gave the mile its name. It descends from the Latin mille passus, the Roman mile, by way of Old English mil and Middle English myle. For centuries after Rome, miles of many lengths coexisted; a sixteenth-century Mercator map, for example, shows small, medium and large Flemish miles on a single scale bar. The English statute mile was fixed by an Act of Parliament under Elizabeth I in 1593, which declared that a mile contains eight furlongs, or 5,280 feet.

The 1959 international yard and pound agreement made that mile exactly 1,609.344 meters. A slightly longer US survey mile, about 1,609.347 meters, lingered in American land surveys and was slated for retirement from 1 January 2023. Today the mile is the road unit of the United Kingdom, the United States, Liberia and Myanmar, along with several territories such as the Bahamas, Belize, Guam and the US Virgin Islands. In Canada it survives chiefly in rail transport and horse racing.

1 mile = 1,609.344 meters (exactly).

Sources: Wikipedia: Mile; Wikipedia: Foot (unit); NIST Guide to the SI, Appendix B.8: conversion factors

Link (li)

US & ImperialTraditional unit (still used in some regions)

One hundredth of a chain, 7.92 inches (0.201168 m). A surveying unit, one link of Gunter's chain.

Each link is the small piece that makes up a surveyor's chain, and the chain's hundred links gave decimal fractions to a system built on feet and yards. A single link measures 7.92 inches, or exactly 0.201168 m, because it is one hundredth of a 66-foot chain. Because of that, distances could be recorded in whole chains and links without fractions.

Edmund Gunter introduced the 100-link chain in England in 1620, and the link spread across the English-speaking world with it. Twenty-five links make a rod, 1,000 make a furlong and 8,000 make a mile. The exact size depends on which foot is used: the pre-1959 imperial foot gives about 201.1677 mm, the US survey foot about 201.1684 mm, and the international foot exactly 201.168 mm. Since the US survey foot was retired after 2022, the international value applies there too. Metric and electronic surveying replaced links in the twentieth century, though old deeds still use them.

1 link = 0.201168 meters (exactly).

Sources: Wikipedia: Link (unit); Wikipedia: Chain (unit)

Related conversions

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